


Into the Velvet Night

by TheBitterKitten



Series: Night Calling [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: DInner and a show, Dark Will Graham, Domesticity, Fluff, Fluff with vague angst, HannibaLibre, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, Idiots in Love, M/M, Murder Husbands, Possessive Hannibal Lecter, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Sassy Hannibal Lecter, Sassy Will Graham, Will Graham Loves Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham is a Tease
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:07:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27751279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBitterKitten/pseuds/TheBitterKitten
Summary: Will and Hannibal attend an opera.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Series: Night Calling [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2043592
Comments: 7
Kudos: 131





	Into the Velvet Night

Will is settled comfortably on their sofa, legs draped carelessly over Hannibal’s as the other man reads  _Les Misérables_ aloud in the original French. One arm cradles the book flush against Will’s knee and the other hand turns to the next page as he reaches it. There’d be a fire in the fireplace this evening if they were anywhere cooler.As it stands, the enormous woven fan spins idle circles above their heads, more placebo than actual cooling. It’s beautifully quiet, except for the faint rush of the waves down the beach and the silk of Hannibal’s voice, rising and falling with the words he’s speaking. Will is buzzing with something he doesn’t want to name, something that feels featherweight bright and immediate, precious and delicate as an exhale.He wants to chalk it up to the wine they’d had with dinner, but that would be an injustice. The meal was rather simple by Hannibal’s standards; beef tail (“beef”, according to the little recipe index card) in a red wine reduction with plantains and rice. Delicious all the same. Will is not at all surreptitiously scrolling on his mobile through endless photos of sad little loves at the local dog shelter as Hannibal reads.

“Surely I can hold your attention better than the dogs you haven’t had the chance to bring home,” Hannibal says primly, switching to English. 

“ _Bien sûr, mais, cette partie traîne,_ ” * Will replies just to spite him, before he adds in English, “It’s just Fantine struggling alone with her daughter at the hands of other people until she dies.”

Hannibal seems like he’s about say a lot of pithy and poignant things to that, but Will really wishes he wouldn’t just now. It must show in his face, because Hannibal only pointedly offers, “Speaking French, hearing English, and still, even now, reading Spanish?”

Will looks up, holding his gaze with something obstinate, and then shrugs. He returns to reading through profiles of dogs who could be his on his phone. “I have an eidetic memory. I pick up languages fast.”

Hannibal just smiles. “And of course, your considerable intelligence puts that eidetic memory to good use.”

“If we’re going to keep reading this, can we skip ahead to... Valjean taking in Cosette, or wherever? Or will your neuroses preclude anything but every word given its full measure?” Will changes the subject, feels the prickle of warmed blood in his cheeks. He would move, pull his legs away from Hannibal. Find an excuse to get up and go to the kitchen for something or other. But Hannibal’s arm, anticipating, is molded steel around his knees and he can’t move them. Will swallows instead. 

“Here is a good place to stop for the evening; it’s getting on. But,” Hannibal hesitates, and it’s so neatly executed it might be genuine if it weren’t Hannibal, “I have tickets for an opera tomorrow evening. Would you join me, Will?”

Will rather likes attending shows with Hannibal, he’s decided. The idea of enjoyment struck him sometime after  _Madame Butterfly,_ solidified after  _Carmen_. There’s a vibrance and vitality to the whole experience: the preparation, the dinner before, the show itself, the  _after_.

“Sure, yeah, my evening’s free,” Will says, and now he’s blushing for an entirely different reason, feels excitement zipping down his nerves at the prospect.

Hannibal nods. “Settled, then. Tomorrow, five-thirty for dinner.” He releases Will’s knees. Will is about to pull them down, but some part of him is already aching at the loss. He doesn’t move. “You can keep reading. Get through this part and the next.” His eyes are on his phone.

“That’s around thirty pages, Will,” Hannibal says, questioning. 

“You have wine to wet your tongue.”

Hannibal regards him, considering, but reopens the book and begins to read where he left off.

The next evening, there’s a suit laid out for him like a promise as he heads into the bedroom to get ready. There’s always an outfit laid out for him on their bed on these kind of nights, though Will has never actually seen Hannibal do it.Will allows it. Enjoys it, if he’s honest, for the opportunity to see himself as Hannibal wishes to see him. This time, it’s a navy linen suit, slim-fitted with narrow lapels, no tie. A subtly patterned waistcoat either ties it all together or pushes it over the edge; Will can’t decide, running his fingers over the soft, thickly-woven fabric. 

“I like it,” he says, to Hannibal waiting in the doorframe. He strips and heads for the warm, fragrant shower the other man has started with Hannibal close behind, cradling Will’s hips in those large hands of his.

And then they’re on each other, the soap in their hands a flimsy pretense for grasping and caressing and _having_ , quickly abandoned. Will presses his mouth to Hannibal’s and everything goes hazy and bright, sharpens down to the point where their lips meet and his tongue vies for purchase behind Hannibal’s teeth. He sinks down and down and down, face pressed against his chest, his stomach, his hips, takes his rapidly stiffening length into his mouth. Will presses forward, ignores the fresh, straining ache of his jaw and the resistance of his throat. Pulls back for air, presses forward again into the wide sea of Hannibal’s hands tangling in his hair, the man before him hoarsely whispering his name. Loses himself in it almost entirely, pushes forward and wrecks himself against his pleasure. 

On a fey impulse, half-formed, when Hannibal is panting and tense and just twitching, Will separates from him in the close confines of the shower. He pulls off and sits back in a kneel. 

“Don’t touch me until I say.”

Hannibal blinks, lets a bereft little moan leave his throat at the sudden loss. Will ignores it, though he thrills to the sound. He has a larger purpose.

“What show are we seeing tonight?” he continues, wiping his mouth with his thumb. As if he doesn’t know Hannibal shivers at that particular motion; as if there’s not water sluicing down over his face from the wide rainfall system in the ceiling above them.

Hannibal gathers himself; what little gathering he requires. He’s breathing deeply and evenly. His hands hang loose at his sides, but his shoulders are pressed flat back against the blue-gray limestone tiles of the shower. His hips are canted perilously out where they had chased the retreat of Will’s hot, soft, sucking mouth. His eyes are half-lidded pools of dark fire, his head thrown back and something like pain written on his face, his lips forming the shape of Will’s name without a sound. Will could gorge himself on the sight. 

“ _Faust_ ,” Hannibal manages, a smile sharpening his cheekbones. He pushes off the wall of the shower, standing at his ease.

“Feeling self-indulgent?” Will asks, raising his brows. 

“You know, you’re rather lucky I like your cheek,” Hannibal says, all mirth but meaning it, drawing closer. 

Will laughs. He stands and retreats from Hannibal, shuts off the water. 

“Yeah, I’d say you do,” he grins, licking his lips. He abandons the heat-fogged, electric space of the shower, leaving Hannibal unsatisfied and needy. 

“Come on, or we’ll be late for dinner.”

Will hasn’t allowed Hannibal to touch him again, always just a step out of his other’s reach. Hannibal catches onto the game when Will takes another step back from him in the bedroom, wrapped only in a towel. He tilts his head, assessing, and then nods, resigned. Will thinks he might never get enough of how very little Hannibal chooses to show, regardless of how much he’s feeling. If he focuses, the fraught energy between Hannibal’s need and his curiosity to see what Will is going to do is enough to set Will on fire. He debates whether to give up now and lay himself out on the bed, spread his legs and bury his face in a pillow, or see his design through to the end of the evening. He’s warm, not just from the shower, feels his limbs loose and languid in their sockets. Quietly burns with a taut heat they haven’t quite stoked to a full blaze.

“I only wish we’d started a few minutes later.” 

And that seals it. Will is deliberately teasing as he pulls his trousers up over his hips. He seats them properly against his body, and takes care in zipping the fly. Will buttons up the dark blue waistcoat by meager inches, fingers splayed against the rich fabric. He feels Hannibal’s irresistible mix of pleasure and wanton regret that he chose so many layers for Will to wear this evening, as Will is incinerated under Hannibal’s gaze. He smiles, a little private thing that Hannibal drinks in like water. It’s going to be a good night.

The suits Hannibal chooses for him invariably set off Will’s features so that people take note and look up at him. He’d always dressed himself to blend in, to recede. Mostly for comfort and practicality, but also to escape a kind of notice Will hadn’t yet had the courage to give words. And after, he’d dressed so only Hannibal himself would take notice. He’d never really stopped that. Even after Florence, and the incident at Muskrat Farm, and the long, crawling, lonely years after, he found himself combing his hair into submission and tucking his buttondown neatly into his trousers as if Hannibal could still see them from his cell in the bowels of the BSHCI. This suit is no different.

Will slings his jacket over his shoulder near the front door. Hannibal locks up and they walk to the car, at some distance Will deems appropriate or safe between them. Hannibal obeys on the ride to town, never once crossing the dividing line of the console. 

“Fantine affects you so deeply?” Hannibal asks. If Will isn’t pulling punches, neither will he. Will expects this, and now that it’s not in the moment, he’s fine. Welcomes it, even.

“She was only trying to live, and other people dragged her into things she couldn’t escape from. She had to give up everything; she gave up her hair, her teeth, her body for a greedy lie. When she tried to defend herself, she was threatened with jail.” Will doesn’t hide the edge in his voice. 

“But Valjean risked his freedom to save her. He intervened when he didn’t have to, gambledthe life he’d built for himself.” Hannibal is only relating the facts of the plot, but there’s something else he wants Will to hear.

“That was unrelated, the court scene. It was between Valjean and Javert. And, it should be noted that finding out Valjean’s identity literally killed Fantine from the shock.” Will would end there, see what justification Hannibal could come up with, but there’s something delicate and uncertain in his face that Will wants to wipe away. So he continues, “But Valjean saw Fantine, where other people saw an object, or a means to an end.” He offers Hannibal a little vulnerable smile in the small space of the car with the sound of the road and classical music filling their ears.

“Valjean cared for her as much as he could given the circumstances. He took in her daughter, loved her as his own, when Fantine was gone. Gave Cosette the best life he could. Denied her nothing.” 

“Would you deny me anything?” Will drops the pretense, too curious.

“As you’re so callously denying me? No. Never. You only need ask, and sooner or later you shall have it, if I haven’t already provided it.”

Will swallows, struck dumb. And all of a sudden, it’s plain, right there in the open, not even expecting a response. He reaches out to touch Hannibal, then, but remembers himself and his purpose, and pulls back. “Valjean paid dearly for the opportunity to care for Cosette.”

“As far along as we are in the story, he counts it as a price well-paid.”

“I rather enjoyed that he faked his death by falling into the ocean.”

They share a smile, warmed by that last moment on the cliff above waves.

They’re all too soon at their destination, pulling into a parking space. Will bites his lip. He wants to say something, say anything about this game, but part of it is knowing Hannibal sees it unspoken, and will rise to meet the challenge. Hannibal gets out, one fluid motion that might be part of a dance. Will follows his figure as he walks around the car to open Will’s door.

Hannibal’s expression through the glass is something that might fill that vast empty space inside him, once and for all. Will swallows, and gets out. 

Will makes up for the chasm of their physical distance— or rather, mischievously worsens it— with lingering, black-lashed glances over the table at dinner. The restaurant is near the opera house, judging by the dress clothes of the patrons sitting at other tables. They’re checking their watches or mobiles for the time and calling their waiter for a preemptive tab in black suits or tuxedoes, or sparkling full-length gowns.

Will delights in making Hannibal go quietly to pieces over the main course. He’s been swimming in the other man’s truly admirable self-control this whole time, even as he’s testing and pushing for the line where it breaks.

Over the past hour and a half, he’s felt the welling tide of Hannibal’s predatory, consuming possessiveness; trod the narrow path between teasing Hannibal mercilessly and suffering (suffering being a relative term) the consequences. He’d let his legs fall apart in the car, fingertips skimming over the fabric clothing his thighs as if it weren’t there, felt the car drift with Hannibal’s gaze. He held the door for a couple as they entered the restaurant behind them, held the woman’s eyes, ran his gaze down her figure and smiled. 

He let the waiter’s fingers brush against his as he took the menu, let him fill and fill his water glass; drank deeply enough that the waiter would have ample cause to refill it. And even with Will at his most devilishly flirtatious towards Hannibal himself, all coy pliant submission and heavy breaths and plaintive little murmurs at the taste of what’s in his mouth— Hannibal has managed to keep his steady, serene calm and perfect posture. His voice hasn’t even faltered once as he relates the intersections between Rousseau’s social contract and Faust’s treatment of his duchy in Goethe. Will thrills to it. 

But the break in Hannibal’s iron will comes as he is bringing a forkful of filet mignon to his mouth.Will, acting on instinct, has slotted his knee just barely between Hannibal’s open, hopeful thighs, about to press it against that sweet thickness swollen at his crotch. Will’s knee is so tantalizingly close Hannibal must surely feel the heat radiating from his skin through the fabric of both of their trousers.But Will pulls away just before Hannibal’s knees can snap shut against each other and trap Will’s leg between them. They close instead onto nothing, empty air.

Will feels Hannibal’s raw, frustrated need and desire crash over him like a king wave, sees Hannibal’s hand tremble almost imperceptibly around his fork.Will drinks it in, sips at his wine and smiles. 

“Your behavior is really quite unanswerable,” Hannibal mutters. 

So, when dessert comes, Will lifts a spoonful of caramel gelato to his lips. He feels Hannibal’s eyes upon him. Hannibal’s gaze is plain (and feverish, if only to Will), heedless of the other people in the room. His eyes track the motion of the spoon from the little dish sprinkled with almonds to Will’s open, waiting mouth. His lips close lushly around it, sucking the gelato from the firm metal captured between them. The gelato, creamy thick cold against his tongue, is not anywhere near as satisfying as Hannibal’s sharp inhale of breath and the sudden bob of the Adam’s apple of his throat. Hannibal’s own tiramisu lies utterly forgotten on the table before him; his fingers lie twitching against his spoon. Will basks in his victory. He could luxuriate forever in the pagan fire that he alone can make Hannibal ignore food for the mere sight of him. Will, just Will, can make Hannibal forgo nourishment, life itself, for only a little glimpse of himself. Will can’t help but smile. He’s light as air, floats now on this exquisite high which he wants never to come down from. Hannibal pays the bill, offers his arm for Will. Will denies him, standing on his own, and heads for the door without even a spare glance behind him. 

Hannibal matches his stride on the short walk to the theatre, his tall figure a welcome and steady presence despite the fire rolling off him and threatening to drown Will. It’s dark now, pools of the streetlights and ambient light from the shops guiding their steps. Will is so hot he might let Hannibal have him up against the side of whatever building they’re passing now and damn the passersby, but he has a plan. And it will be worth it. Hannibal holds the door to the theatre, producing their tickets for the usher. They stroll into the opulent foyer and find their seats.

In the suits Hannibal chooses for him, and in the scattered chandelier light of the theatre, Will feels like a jewel carefully polished and set just so. Something precious and rare: to be seen and admired, inviting caresses but never quite touchable. Will sips at a double whisky during intermission, watches Hannibal entertain the prurient busybody making conversation at them. 

Hannibal endures the banal conversation with practiced, dismissive ease. The too-eager, too-open man in an ill-fitted suit has two kids. No, he didn’t learn his lesson from the first, ha, ha. They’re five and three. Will isn’t sure how they got on this subject. The older might go into ballet, if her classes are anything to go by. No, he wouldn’t trade them for anything. Yeah, even with the late sleepless nights and early mornings. Hannibal is deep in thought, then. Probably thinking of Alana and Margot and their boy, from the set of his mouth. Will allows it for a brief moment, but it’s not enough for Hannibal to simply be denied; Hannibal has to feel it and only it, but deeply. Will shifts on his feet, so the broadness of his chest becomes apparent. The man’s gaze, torn from Hannibal’s imposing frame, slips over to Will’s narrower one; tries to suss out the relationship between them. Hannibal is a force of nature, so it’s only natural that the man’s gaze falls first on him. But Hannibal’s body language betrays him, won’t let the intrusive man ignore Will standing at a respectful distance from Hannibal’s side. Hannibal sips at his dark, syrupy wine and draws the man’s attention back to himself with a little tilt of his head.

Will is suddenly alight with the confirmation that Hannibal is  _wanting,_ claims him, wants no other being on earth to have him. He feels powerful, coveted, limitless. Satisfaction purrs through him, headier than the whisky in his glass. The lights dim, once and then twice, calling the patrons back to the show. Will throws back the rest of his drink and sets the glass on a table, walks away from them both without waiting for the polite end of the conversation. He knows it’s rude, and revels in Hannibal’s growing exasperation as he follows after. They’re in the end game, now, but with half a show and the drive home to endure, it’s work at this point for Will, too.

Will subtly crosses his legs and folds his arms away from Hannibal in the dark of their seats in the the theatre, preventing any stray brush against each other during the second act. It’s almost secondary to the fact that Will is focused on the actors. He wants to feel the thick tension emanating from the figures on the stage under the harsh lights. They’re all garishly made-up: bold strokes of contour and black eyebrows making their expressions visible to the nosebleeds. They walk choreographed paths in stiff, ornate costumes that must reek of body odor from those who have lived these roles before. There is a fraught push and pull between the living bodies moving on the stage and the characters: people are living this moment for the first and hundredth time, existing somewhere between the ordinary and the divine. Will can feel every emotion from his seat; fresh and immediate from the better actors and lived-in, worn out, from the lesser. Will feels the dark call of the void from Faust, aged and at ends, cursing youth and its lost glory, but he sails, a kite on a brisk wind, with Marguerite’s aria. Dies, and lives again in the duel.

He keeps himself deliberately away from Hannibal during the standing ovation only with effort, focusing instead on the cresting wave of adoration from the crowd, the euphoria from the actors as they take their bows. He slips away from Hannibal as they walk, neatly dodging the rather subtle way Hannibal tries to brush up against him under the guise of avoiding another patron in the foyer. 

He can’t help but draw closer when they’re on the street and walking to the car, but he remembers his purpose and shoves his hands in his pockets.

“Faust killed Valentín only because Mephistopheles held Valentín’s sword and let him,” Will says, just a hair too off-handedly.

“And that resonated with you, Will?” 

“I still haven’t forgiven you for holding the gun,” It’s not a confession, more bold goading.

“‘All good things come to those who wait’ is an oft-spoken proverb,” Hannibal murmurs. 

“I imagine that’s a rather immediate lesson for you right now, isn’t it?” Will beams at Hannibal.

“You’re being viciously cruel, yes,” Hannibal replies, fixing Will to the spot and stopping his breath with only a gaze. “And what do you think might happen once we arrive home?” 

“I might go to bed.”

“You won’t sleep.”

“I’m counting on that.”

Will has to steel himself before he slides into the passenger seat. It feels rather like walking into a lion’s den, with Hannibal holding the door open for him. They’re an hour away from home. But Will is patient, too. He can survive this, survive without touching his other, even as the image of his hand in Hannibal’s lap, his head buried in Hannibal’s lap and the car swerving dangerously into oncoming headlights fills his mind. 

The air is close and hot, a piano concerto swirling suffocatingly around them as Hannibal drives. 

“Will we get to the kitchen?” Will asks, his own need slipping through in his voice.

“If we make it out of the car, I’ll have you in bed if I have to carry you there,” Hannibal says, and Will can’t decide what he wants more. 

Words won’t come to him in this thick darkness, and Hannibal is focused on the road ahead, so they are silent. The needle on the speed dial edges ever higher, as Will feels something building and building between them, trembles for the breaking point.

But finally they’re home. Hannibal parks the car and Will is out, his jacket forgotten on the seat behind him. He heads for the door, hand fishing for his keys in his pocket. Hannibal is somehow already there, opening the door and ushering Will through, his eyes a consuming void of need as Will kicks off his shoes and socks.

Will meets his gaze, and then darts for their bedroom, a sudden animal instinct spurring him on from the look on Hannibal’s face.

It’s something like a hunt as Will flees Hannibal, wishing to be caught.His bare feet slap against the parquet floor as he races down the hall. 

They barely make it to the door of their bedroom before Will feels himself lifted and thrown bodily onto the bed as if he weighs nothing. Feels Hannibal’s delicious weight cover him, press him down into the soft cloud of their bed. Smells only the bergamot and tuberose haze of Hannibal’s aftershave. He lets go to the fevered kiss Hannibal presses to his mouth; parts his lips willingly and succumbs. His other surges against him, and Will cannot resist, doesn’t want to. He is laid bare by precise and steady hands stripping him of the waistcoat, his shirt, his trousers and briefs pulled down together. Hannibal is on him, his hands searing hot where they meet skin, pressing against Will’s waist, digging in to his thighs as they’re parted. A wide, soft palm cradles his face. Will shuts his eyes, lets himself drown, but a need forms in his mind, the image of it. Suddenly, as much as he wants this, just this as it is now, it needs _more_.

He fumbles blindly in the nightstand for a little bottle. Once it’s in his grasp, he gathers all of his strength and flips them.

“You’ll let me have you?” he asks, a foregone conclusion. 

“Anything, Will, _please_ ,” is his answer, and Will will never, absolutely never come down from this.

He pulls the clothes off Hannibal, strips him bare of the black suit and white shirt and anything between their aching needful skin. 

It’s all a rush of blood in his ears, moans falling like gemstones and honey around them and Will can’t tell who is who, can’t handle this, can’t manage this. Is somewhere completely outside of himself with the slick sweet joy of having this man thrilling beneath him and inviting him in. 

He blinks, and he’s half-aware of himself again, looks down at his other. Hannibal is at  _ends_ ,  panting and flushed, eyes fire-dark and half-lidded, burning into Will. All Will can focus on is Hannibal’s scorching, silk-smooth heat squeezing and  _squeezing_ him, begging, forcing him to move. Will allows one little push down of his hips, feels the rigid nub within him. Hannibal, who never moves without deliberate purpose, is writhing beneath him, seeking for more. Will can still feel his slow pulse, that languid, measured rush of blood through his veins. It’s never any faster than this. Eighty-six beats a minute, eight-six contractions of his heart sending pushes and wells of blood throughout his body.

Will moves, then, wanting more than anything to raise it to eighty-seven, ninety-two. He fucks into Hannibal like the world is ending, like he is dying and this is the last moment they have together. He grasps for a handhold in the sheets, on Hannibal’s body, and his vision goes blank behind his closed eyes when Hannibal clings to him. He’s utterly lost in this, in the slick push of himself further and further into Hannibal, only finding welcome and a consuming desire to give _more_. He’s swarmed by the gratification that Hannibal has him, _has him,_ and fully, as long as Will lives.

Hannibal’s flesh is between his teeth. That pulse is thrumming in his throat, the full scent of him lurking underneath tuberose; ashes and music and dark need, so much love it’s fathomless. He gives in to the crush and pull of their bodies together. He’s coming, a hurricane ripping through him, blotting out the light. One moment, he’s there in Hannibal’s arms: everything so much and so thick and so close and hot he can’t bear it, will shatter, and the next is the sweet peaceful calm of the void. 

When he comes to, Hannibal is holding him, still wrapped around him, and Will can’t find words. He just lies there, breathing. From the stickiness between them— when sensation returns to his body and sometime after, when he can process it— Hannibal has come, too. Will only regrets he couldn’t witness it, memorize Hannibal in pieces.

“Was it worth it?” Will manages at last, words slurred and drawled. 

“Yes. I’d pay again, thrice-over, to have you like this.” Hannibal voice is so warm, so rich with affection Will sinks into it without thinking. He drifts.

When he comes back to himself, he’s clean and tucked beneath the sheets. Hannibal is beside him, reading on his tablet, waiting. He looks over as Will rouses, takes him in.

“How are you feeling, Will?”

Will could say anything. He could say he loves Hannibal, since they haven’t out loud, but that’s clear already. He could say he wants Hannibal to read to him again. He does want to hear about Enjolras and _cour des miracles_ , but if the book is still in the living room, Hannibal would have to leave him briefly to get it, and so that's right out. 

So he just settles for something that’s true.

“I found a dog and I want to bring her home.”

Hannibal laughs, then, a pure and breathless thing Will wants to drink up like water and life itself.

“I’m only surprised it took you this long.”

**Author's Note:**

> *”Of course, but this part drags on.”
> 
> The dish Hannibal serves for dinner is based on one once available at Al Carbón in Havana.


End file.
